# Chapter 58: Empty Seat Banquet Invitation
Tree Arena, Battle Arena No. 15923, Ruins of Shallow Waters.
What came into view was a shallow water area barely covering the ankles, with scattered broken pillars and collapsed walls sparsely distributed throughout this region. Compared to these, the most eye-catching feature was the thousand-meter-tall giant tree at the center, its canopy completely covering the entire shallow water area.
The scorching sun in the sky was blocked, and beneath the tree canopy, the world was filled with water vapor. Light particles occasionally floated up from the water, hunted by passing insects. The scenery was beautiful with a dreamlike quality.
However, the competitors of the Overlord Hunter team had no mind to appreciate these sights. They had already formed their formation and were advancing methodically.
Among these 58 people, the captain was a man with long hair tied into a ponytail, wearing rimless glasses, his right arm replaced by a mechanical prosthetic. His gaze was calm yet alert. Unlike the relaxed demeanor of others, he always felt the pressure of this battle was considerable. Matching against a 58-person scale Overlord unit would surely be extremely difficult to deal with.
In front of the captain was a three-meter-tall muscular man holding a heavy round shield. He called himself Shield Armor, his ability system being a reflection-type heavy tank within the tank category. Although slow in movement, he was exceptionally confident when facing individual powerful enemies.
Walking shoulder to shoulder with Shield Armor was another muscular man, the Earth Pulse System Muscular Man, Titan Griz. Bare-chested, his gaze was somewhat dark, the reason being his setback in the previous world. However, after returning to Paradise and receiving comprehensive comfort and encouragement from his lover, he no longer doubted his life.
A bit further back was a soft and beautiful mature woman dressed in loose white robes that concealed her voluptuous figure. Although her clothing wasn't revealing and was quite loose, it gave people an itching, lustful feeling in their hearts. Her name was Eleanor, but most called her the Pleasure Witch.
Interestingly enough, the Pleasure Witch's power system came from the Witch Realm, but this power system was notorious in the Witch Realm, even more so than Black Wizards.
Not far from the Pleasure Witch was a man wrapped entirely in black bandages. Under his bandages, countless soft-bodied insects seemed to writhe. Occasionally, leech-like black bugs would poke out from the gaps in the bandages, twisting wantonly. This black-bandaged man was called the Rot Mage. Just from the fact that nearby teammates were unwilling to approach him, one could tell how dangerous his abilities were.
Further back was a twin-tailed healer. Her lively, clever gaze indicated she was a sunny and cheerful girl. At this level of strength, such good-natured girls had long since disappeared from Reincarnation Paradise. Only in large adventure groups from Apocalypse Paradise could they still be found. In Reincarnation Paradise, those seemingly beautiful high-rank young girls must be avoided at all costs, because you simply couldn't imagine how hair-raising they could be when in a good mood.
The somewhat depressed fire-element brother was also in the team, apparently still not recovered from his previous experience in the Golden Arena.
The reason Earth Pulse System Muscular Man Titan Griz and the fire-element brother had successfully survived was that after Su Xiao used Blood Feather on their team's healer, he didn't continue the pursuit. After all, the fire-element brother and his group were at the Absolute Strength level. Without being hunted by Su Xiao, they wouldn't have died miserably from the Blood Feather's effects.
The group arrived at the giant tree. A blood-colored mark floated in mid-air. Seeing this, the captain signaled to the long-range bearded man beside him. A dark ray bounced rapidly through the air several times before striking the blood-colored mark directly.
Boom!
A wave of blood energy surged down from above, like a turbulent waterfall of blood. Everyone present stepped back in succession, except for the two tank-type muscular men who stood firm at the front. This might be the charm of tank-type abilities.
When the surging blood energy wave subsided, the crowd didn't see a massive Overlord creature. Instead, they saw a figure holding a sheathed long sword in his right hand, sitting casually on the wooden roof beside the giant tree. What was even more surprising was that a cat was actually perched on his shoulder.
There was no terrifying roar, no chilling aura, no overwhelming pressure. This Overlord unit was actually a human, seemingly without hostility, with a calm expression.
"Uh... this..."
The twin-tailed healer was somewhat stunned. She didn't notice that the captain standing beside her had his cheek twitching violently, because the captain saw the ф mark on the sword guard. This mark was small, just a decoration, but upon seeing it, the captain felt terrible.
Even worse than the captain were Earth Pulse System Muscular Man Titan Griz and the fire-element brother. Titan Griz quietly retreated a few steps, which was naturally noticed by Shield Armor beside him.
Shield Armor and Titan Griz were both tank-types, and main tanks of similar strength at that. The two naturally didn't get along. Now with a powerful enemy before them, one of the main tanks, Titan Griz, had actually chickened out. This made Shield Armor unable to suppress a sneer. His heavy round shield emitted a deep metallic hum, his contempt for Titan Griz maxed out.
Bang!
A loud explosion suddenly occurred. A pitch-black gravity bullet struck Su Xiao on the wooden roof. Gravity and dust exploded violently, and he was blasted into the giant tree behind.
Seeing this, all challengers focused their long-range attacks on Su Xiao, drowning him in attacks of various colors and characteristics. This situation lasted about five minutes, until the earth pulse tree in this area snapped with a loud crack.
Wood splinters flew everywhere, embers and sparks danced in the air. Su Xiao fell with the collapsing tree onto the shallow water ground below.
Before this battle began, he had deliberately reduced his health to below 70%, thereby triggering "Immortal Constitution," gaining a 950-point boost to body defense. Combined with his base body defense, he also had:
Ultimate Basic Passive Overlord Power: Increases physical damage immunity by 25%, energy damage immunity by 25%.
Basic Passive Body Soul: For every point of True Stamina attribute, an additional 0.35 points of body defense are derived.
Blade Grandmaster Lv.70 Ultimate Ability: Blade Domain (Supreme Level Passive): You gain 10% total damage reduction.
Wild Hunt Night Eternal Grade Leather Armor Base Bonus: 15% physical/energy damage reduction.
Wild Hunt Night Equipment Effect 1 Spirit Armor (Core Passive): Increases equipment defense by 450 points.
Magic Immunity Constitution (Passive): Immune to 70% of magic-type damage.
Don't think Magic Immunity Constitution is only useful against spellcasters. Contractors also have plenty of magic-type abilities. For example, among the 58 challengers currently fighting, more than one-fifth of their output had magic-type characteristics. After all, who could resist powerful, flashy, and highly potential magic-type abilities?
Besides the above body defense bonuses and damage reduction, Su Xiao's greatest survival guarantee was his 2.08 million health points.
So Su Xiao wanted to test how far his survivability could go. This was the Arena where death wasn't permanent, and there was no better place to test survivability.
Therefore, after the battle began, Su Xiao never attacked, not even blocking. He only continuously formed crystal layers on his body surface, enduring five minutes of the 58 challengers' scraping... ahem, spectacular bombardment.
"Stay steady, this Overlord unit only has 67.55% health left. He must be a high-speed, high-attack, low-defense Overlord unit."
A brother who had activated detection equipment shouted. Hearing this news, the others felt much more at ease. Unfortunately, the cruel truth was that when Su Xiao first entered this place, his health had already been self-damaged to 69.90% to trigger "Immortal Constitution." In other words, the 58 scraping technicians' five-minute bombardment had caused a total of 2.35% high-value damage.
Boom!
Blood energy suddenly appeared, and all attacks aimed at Su Xiao momentarily stalled. He instantly disappeared from his position, reappearing in front of the main tank, Shield Armor.
Shield Armor, three meters tall and powerfully built, was visibly stunned when he saw Su Xiao. Tanks feared most that the boss would ignore them. His eyes showed the characteristic deep, fierce light of a tank, and he gripped his tens-of-tons heavy black steel round shield, charging toward Su Xiao.
Su Xiao didn't draw his sword. He wanted to test the improvement of his straight kick, and this shield-tank charging at him really made him want to kick. He executed a straight kick forward.
Boom!!!
All challengers present felt the ground tremble beneath their feet. It was as if the earth had turned into the sea, with a wave surging outward in all directions, followed by the scene of the ground shattering.
The twin-tailed healer, who was about to cast healing support on Shield Armor, felt a buzz in her ears. She was only at the top tier of Ninth Rank. Because healers became rarer at higher ranks, she had managed to join a team with an average strength of Absolute Strong level. Now she felt like a pitiful little boat in a raging storm. She checked her health and almost burst into tears. Only 9.58% health remained. She had nearly died from an unclear large-scale attack.
Actually, the twin-tailed healer was mistaken. This wasn't a group attack; it was a single-target straight kick. As for Shield Armor himself, who received this kick...
In the moment before the kick struck, Shield Armor still had the characteristic deep, fierce light of a tank in his eyes, thinking to use his reflection ability to teach the enemy the cost of attacking him. But the next instant, the oncoming wind pressure made Shield Armor's hair stand on end. The strong wind pressure forced him to squint, his lips involuntarily opened, changing shape randomly due to the wind pressure, looking somewhat comical.
When the straight kick hit the round shield, the fierce light in Shield Armor's eyes disappeared, his gaze becoming clear. Then, he actually recalled his childhood playmate.
With a boom, the black steel round shield in Shield Armor's hand shattered. His equipment and clothes were torn away with a ripping sound, leaving him in only a pair of shorts, standing in place with golden light radiating from his entire body. This was because the kick had triggered the Arena's protection mechanism. Otherwise, Shield Armor would have turned into bloody buckshot, blasting many teammates behind him into sieves.
Fortunately, the Arena's equipment was virtually constructed; otherwise, having all equipment explode from this kick would definitely make Shield Armor question life.
Shield Armor's physical body stood in place, expressionless, pupils dim and lifeless. Behind him at a higher position was his translucent soul body that had been kicked out. The soul body Shield Armor tilted his head back, mouth wide open, with two miserable tear streaks on his face. This wasn't due to fragile emotions, but because the soul body had suddenly entered the external environment, causing eye irritation.
Witnessing all this, Titan Griz inexplicably felt a sense of satisfaction. He subconsciously retreated a few more steps, moving behind an assassination-type contractor under their puzzled gaze.
With a tearing sound, the Rot Mage ripped open his black bandages, and rot insects surged toward Su Xiao.
"Blade Path Sword: Slay."
A diagonal slash, and with a whoosh, a blood-colored chain was unleashed. When the blood-colored chain disappeared, the Rot Mage also vanished, leaving only scattered crimson sparks in the air.
Seeing this, the twin-tailed healer's heart nearly stopped. The overwhelming pressure made her instinctively look toward the source of danger, then lock eyes with Su Xiao. She saw a tall blood-energy phantom appear behind him. The blood-energy phantom pulled back a soul great bow, aiming a three-to-four-meter-long blood-energy arrow at her.
The scene before the twin-tailed healer's eyes suddenly changed. She was already sitting on a single sofa in the Arena's luxurious waiting room.
"Huh?"
The twin-tailed healer looked around in confusion, seeing the Rot Mage diagonally opposite. His current appearance was as if he had been thrown into a high-speed washing machine, even his hairstyle was that unique.
"Hiss~"
The sound of sharp intakes of breath came. The Pleasure Witch Eleanor appeared, one hand stroking her fair neck, muttering something under her breath.
The number of people in the luxurious waiting room suddenly increased. The reason was that Su Xiao had used "Blade Path Sword: Super Ring Break." When the captain also arrived at the luxurious waiting room, the battle ended.
The luxurious waiting room was very quiet. Everyone was silent, or rather, everyone was traumatized. Especially a certain Soul Hunter brother who dual-cultivated magic and soul systems. After unleashing his ultimate move and dealing a whopping 1265 damage, he just stood there stunned.
If the Lightning Magic God Egg, who dual-cultivated magic + soul + lightning systems, saw this scene, his face would surely show the comforting smile of someone who had been through it.
The luxurious waiting room was terrifyingly quiet, but half a minute later, everyone present started chatting and laughing as if nothing had happened. Everyone silently turned the page on this painful memory. The captain also quietly changed the name of the Overlord Hunter team.
...
[You have won this round of competition.]
[Your Overlord evaluation in the Tree Arena +85. The higher this evaluation index, the stronger the challenger lineup you will match.]
[Based on your current Overlord evaluation, it is estimated that 70-80 hours are needed before matching with a new round of opponents.]
[You have received 5800 Ancient Coins.]
[The Tree Arena Exchange Shop has been opened. You can exchange for the following items.]